


Between the Lines

by cyankelpie



Category: Good Omens (TV), Good Omens - Neil Gaiman & Terry Pratchett
Genre: But they both Know, Feelings Realization, Fluff and Angst, Historical, I don't even know if this counts as a confession, In fact they Overstand, M/M, Mutual Pining, Technically unspoken feelings, They have an understanding
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-01-04
Updated: 2020-01-29
Packaged: 2021-02-27 03:46:48
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 11
Words: 13,722
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22110529
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/cyankelpie/pseuds/cyankelpie
Summary: Crowley took a gulp of ale and gestured with the mug. “Love’s a big word. How can you be sure? Humans mistake these things a lot.”“Angels don’t. If they knew I could feel it, maybe they’d try to tone it down a little.”Crowley stopped moving. Aziraphale was still talking, but he couldn’t hear over the pounding of his pulse in his head. “You can feel that?” he said, when he regained enough of his composure to put together a sentence.“Yes, I—” Aziraphale broke off just for a moment, and his eyes flicked down to the table. “Yes, I can feel it, Crowley.”(It's hard being two supernatural entities on opposite sides who are in love with each other. It's even harder knowing that those feelings are returned, and that acknowledging it openly would be disastrous.)
Relationships: Aziraphale/Crowley (Good Omens)
Comments: 164
Kudos: 380
Collections: Aspec-friendly Good Omens, Good Omens (Complete works), Ixnael’s Recommendations, Ixnael’s SFW corner, Our Own Side





	1. 41 A.D.

Aziraphale pretended to think for a minute before he set down another stone in his game of tic-tac-toe. At last, he’d finally beaten his opponent. His opponent was himself. He kept ending in a tie. This game was ridiculous.

The door to the bar opened, and a low hum of fondness appeared on the edge of Aziraphale’s perception. It appeared to be directed at him. Well, that was flattering, though it wouldn’t be the first time. Aziraphale was well-known and well-liked in this neighborhood. Someone had started a rumor that he was a demigod who spread good fortune, though he was sure he had _no_ idea where they had gotten that idea. Nice as it was to know that Aziraphale had friends, it was never easy becoming familiar with humans. Their lifespans were depressingly short compared to his, so for the most part, he tried to keep his distance. He hoped this one wouldn’t try to come talk to him.

“What have you got? Give me a jug of whatever you think is drinkable.”

Aziraphale froze. He knew that voice. And if the door had just opened, and he had just come in…No, it couldn’t be. He must have just walked in behind someone else.

Well, regardless, he was here, and Aziraphale hadn’t seen him in years, and he did enjoy—That is, he was not opposed to a conversation with the demon. It wasn’t as if he had anyone else to talk to.

“Hello, Crawly—Crowley,” he corrected himself quickly. Crowley barely glanced at him, but—Goodness, that feeling really was coming from—

“Well.” Crowley _liked_ him. What a delightful surprise. “Fancy. Running into you, here.” He took up the seat next to Crowley without an invitation. He certainly didn’t appear to object to Aziraphale’s company. Though, now that he took notice, the demon looked like he was in a sour mood. He still hadn’t said a word since Aziraphale greeted him. It was getting a little awkward. “Still a demon, then?”

“What kind of stupid question is that?” Crowley snapped. “Still a demon—What else am I gonna be, an aardvark?”

It was sort a dumb thing to ask. Perhaps Aziraphale was still distracted by the idea that Crowley liked him. He hadn’t even known a demon could do that. “Salutaria,” he said, and he and Crowley clinked their cups together. He—well, he was rather fond of Crowley too, in fact, though the conversation that he usually enjoyed was somewhat lacking at the moment. “In Rome long?”

“Just nipped in for a quick temptation.” He sounded tired. “You?”

“I thought I’d try Petronus’ new restaurant,” said Aziraphale. “I hear he does remarkable things to oysters.”

Crowley thought for a moment. “I’ve never actually eaten an oyster.”

“Oh?” How was that possible? He had been here four thousand years by now. “Well, let me tempt you to—”

Crowley turned to look at him, and the low hum of affection swelled into the last thing Aziraphale expected.

“Oh, no.” He gave a nervous smile, trying not to stare. “No, that’s…that’s your job, isn’t it.”

Okay, he told himself, trying not to panic as the waiter set down a platter of oysters. Everything was fine. He was just sitting here across from a demon who apparently had, or appeared to have, a…regard for him, of a romantic nature. But, well, appearances could be deceiving, couldn’t they? Crowley was a demon. Aziraphale had never even heard of a demon getting attached to someone, in that manner. Or any other manner, for that matter. It was much easier to believe that he had somehow faked the whole thing. Perhaps it was some sort of practical joke meant to confuse Aziraphale. Well, it had certainly worked.

“What a mess,” he muttered, resting his head in his hand. “Crowley, what are you doing?”

“What am I supposed to be doing?” Crowley had pulled the whole oyster out of the shell and was just holding it between his thumb and forefinger and squinting at it. “This looks like a slug. You really eat this thing?”

“Well, not like _that,_ ” said Aziraphale. “You can’t seriously expect me to believe you’ve never even seen someone eat an oyster.”

“Well, go ahead and demonstrate, if you’re so experienced.” Crowley gestured to the platter.

Aziraphale rolled his eyes, picked up one of the oysters, and slurped it out of the shell. “Oh, that’s quite good,” he muttered, allowing himself a contented smile as he chewed. It was delightfully fresh and plump, and a little on the sweet side. A happy noise escaped him as he swallowed and set the shell face-down on the platter. “Now—”

Crowley was watching him intently when he looked up. Oh, Lord, that feeling was distracting. He wondered how the opposition had figured out how to fake it, and then remembered that he had sensed it from the moment Crowley walked in, before he’d even said hello. Before he even know Aziraphale was there. Oh dear, oh dear—

“I dunno,” Crowley was saying, tilting another of the oysters to grimace at the sheen as the light hit it. “This one looks sick. Are you sure—Oh, what the heaven?”

He’d tilted it too far and spilled seawater all over the table. “Now you’ve ruined two of them,” Aziraphale muttered. He slurped down another, deciding that one of them ought to enjoy the oysters at least. Plus it gave him something to focus on other than Crowley’s feelings. It shouldn’t be affecting him so much. It wasn’t the first time he’d been the object of someone’s affection. Only this was _Crowley._

Frustrated, Crowley picked up a new oyster. “Well, third’s the charm, hm?” He tried to tip it back into his mouth and frowned. “It’s stuck.”

“Then pick up a fork and unstick it,” Aziraphale said impatiently, jabbing a finger at the fork next to the platter. “Honestly—”

“Hey, I’ve never done this before!”

Aziraphale put his face in his hand and sighed. The how and the why were much too ineffable for him to think about right now, so he instead pondered what sort of mess Crowley had gotten himself into. He had seen how painful these things could be for humans, even when they weren’t on opposite sides. It was a massive understatement to say that hell wouldn’t be happy about this, and for that matter heaven probably wouldn’t be thrilled that one of their angels was the sort of person a demon would like. And Aziraphale…

Aziraphale stared down at the table, right in the middle of the veritable cloud of affection Crowley was putting out, and found that he didn’t actually mind.

Crowley grunted at him with an empty shell in one hand and a mouth full of oyster. “Angel. ’M I supposed to chew it?”

“That’s how you normally eat things, yes,” said Aziraphale. His heartbeat thrummed in his ears. Oh dear. Oh, no. He ate another oyster, spilling half the seawater in the process.

“See?” Crowley waved a hand at the mess. “It’s not just me.”

“I wasn’t paying attention,” said Aziraphale defensively.

Crowley’s eyebrows rose. “What’s so distracting that you’re not paying attention to food?”

“Um—” Aziraphale nearly got to his feet and bolted out of the restaurant. He should cut off all association with Crowley immediately, for both their sakes. Things could only get worse from here. It wouldn’t be so bad only having short-lived humans for company, right? He could get used to that. He would be fine, and Crowley would also be fine.

He did not leave the restaurant. He’d probably have driven himself mad worrying about the flaming sword if Crowley hadn’t been there for him to talk about it. He’d probably have lost his mind a lot of times without Crowley.

All he could think to do was keep the conversation going and try to act normal. He forced a casual tone and asked, “What…what were you doing in Rome?”

“What, the temptation? You don’t want to hear about it, trust me,” said Crowley, grimacing.

“Well, it seemed to have you in a rather foul mood.”

“You could say that,” Crowley admitted. He picked up another oyster and considered it. “Done with work for now, though, thank Satan. Even choking down weird slimy fish is better than that.” He held up the shell with a wry smile. “Cheers.”

“You don’t ‘cheers’ with oysters,” said Aziraphale, with an annoyed sigh.

Crowley set it back down. “What say we get something you do ‘cheers’ with, then?”

“Oh—Ah—” Aziraphale looked around. He really, really oughtn’t stay much longer. He needed to spend some time making sense of things, and then packing them away in a remote corner of his mind where he’d never have to worry about it again.

“C’mon,” Crowley wheedled. “One drink won’t hurt.”

His hands fretted at the edge of the table. It had been quite a long time since they had talked. They’d had plenty of friendly conversations before, so another one wouldn’t be disastrous even if Aziraphale did know about Crowley’s feelings now. He just had to ignore the warm aura Crowley was putting out. Pretend everything was normal. “I suppose one drink would be all right.”

“Hey, waiter!” Crowley turned around and waved an arm. “We’re getting thirsty. You got any colors other than ‘brown’?”


	2. 537 A.D.

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Crowley has a very confusing conversation.

Crowley pushed open the door to the tavern and sauntered inside. It was the sort of place he would never have expected Aziraphale to set foot in. Usually, it was full of drunken, rowdy ruffians who, if they weren’t at each other’s throats, were cheering on the ones who were. The place was uncharacteristically peaceful tonight, though. For some reason, everyone seemed to be getting along. That reason was currently sitting in the back corner, with an empty chair and a full mug of ale across from him, waving Crowley over.

“Hey, sorry ‘m late,” said Crowley, taking up occupancy of the chair and taking a swig of the ale. The thing he had sworn nobody would ever find out about fluttered in his chest the way it usually did when he was around Aziraphale. It was nice of the angel to order for him. He hadn’t told Crowley why he had wanted to meet, but Crowley secretly hoped that he had given his proposition a little more thought and changed his mind. Surely, from a logical standpoint, he could understand that it didn’t make sense for both of them to be doing all this work.

“Thank you for meeting with me,” said Aziraphale, looking even more nervous than usual. “I—I’m in a bit of a bind, I’m afraid.”

Crowley’s eyebrows rose. Not what he had hoped for, then. Well, if Aziraphale needed help, he was happy to provide it. Much happier than he should have been, in fact. “What d’you need?” he said too quickly, and then filled his mouth with ale before he could say anything too stupid.

“Advice,” said Aziraphale. “It’s…something of a moral quandary. I can’t figure out what to do.”

“And you’re gonna ask a demon?” said Crowley. “I couldn’t even tell why the Original Sin was bad, remember?”

“Yes, I know.” He really did look distressed. “I don’t have anyone else to ask.”

Crowley was glad he’d worn his dark glasses so he could study Aziraphale’s face without being obvious. It figured that he couldn’t just ask the other angels. It might reflect badly on him, or they might not give him an answer he liked. And Aziraphale had always followed his own conscience. Like with the flaming sword. Crowley could still see him wringing his hands on top of the wall, _Oh, I hope I didn’t do the wrong thing…_

“Can’t promise I can help, but I can take a crack at it,” said Crowley. “What’s the issue?”

“It’s...well, it’s Guinevere.” Aziraphale fiddled with his hands. His eyes flitted around the bar. “And—Lancelot, I’m afraid.”

Crowley waited, but Aziraphale didn’t elaborate. “Yeah, what about ‘em?” he prompted.

Aziraphale signed and rubbed his forehead. “Guinevere and Lancelot. Do I have to spell it out for you, Crowley.”

Crowley choked on his ale. “As, like, an item…?”

Aziraphale pursed his lips and nodded.

He wasn’t sure whether he should be amused or horrified. Mostly, he was confused. “What about that is tough to figure out? That’s adultery, isn’t it? One of the big ten. Huge no with your lot.”

“I’m aware,” said Aziraphale. “It isn’t just that, I’m afraid. They’re in love.” He sighed again, resting his forehead against his fingertips. “Which is, as you put it, a huge yes with my lot.”

Crowley took a gulp of ale and gestured with the mug. “Love’s a big word. How can you be sure? Humans mistake these things a lot.”

“Angels don’t. It’s a bit hard to ignore when they’re in the room.”

“What, do they, like, parade it around?” asked Crowley. “Seems unwise.”

“Obviously they don’t,” said Aziraphale. “Not to the humans, anyway. If they knew I could feel it, maybe they’d try to tone it down a little.”

Crowley stopped moving. Aziraphale was still talking, but he couldn’t hear over the pounding of his pulse in his head. “You can feel that?” he said, when he regained enough of his composure to put together a sentence. Thanks to a great effort of will, he kept his voice even, but it still sounded too thin in his ears.

“Yes, I—” Aziraphale broke off just for a moment, and his eyes flicked down to the table. “Yes, I can feel it, Crowley.”

Oh, god, he knew. The bastard _knew._ Crowley felt like he might discorporate on the spot. How long had he known? Decades? Centuries? He was going to have to hide someplace where Aziraphale could never find him. Probably hell. Angels didn’t go there. He’d take a desk job. Earth had been fun while it lasted, but when it was time to go it was time to go.

He was just about to make an excuse and leave when it occurred to him that Aziraphale was the one who asked him here.

“And is, er.” Crowley croaked, his throat dry. He shouldn’t be asking this. He had to ask this, or he might never sleep again. “Is it, uh, mutual?” He immediately wished a meteor would crash through the tavern roof and take him right off the face of the Earth. If it didn’t, he was just going to die of embarrassment anyway.

“Yes,” said Aziraphale, and for a second Crowley forgot to breathe. But then he said, “Crowley, the conversation started off ‘Guinevere _and_ Lancelot.’”

“Oh.” Crowley drew a deep breath and tried not to notice the cold, sinking feeling in his stomach. Like he had any right at all to be disappointed. “Right. Course.”

“And…obviously my lot would disapprove,” Aziraphale went on. “But, well, they aren’t hurting anyone. Even Arthur…I think he knows, and just lets it happen.”

Crowley frowned. _Obviously, my lot would disapprove._ That was probably a coincidence, right? _They aren’t hurting anyone._

“If anyone called them out publicly, it would be chaos. Can you even imagine? They would be executed. Not that Lancelot would go easily—They might even go to war.” He gave an agonized sigh. “I do so hate starting wars. Do you think, if anyone upstairs asked, I could just pretend I didn’t know?”

He was doing a pretty good job of it right now, Crowley thought. “Hard to, when you can feel that stuff.”

“I suppose you’re right.” Aziraphale rubbed the bridge of his nose. “Oh, I don’t want to do this. Poor Guinevere.”

“Guinevere?” said Crowley. “Arthur’s the one getting cuckolded. As long as we’re talking about ‘not hurting anyone.’”

“I told you, Arthur doesn’t seem to have a problem with it. And think of Guinevere’s position, in love with Lancelot against her loyalty to Arthur. The poor dear must be out of her mind trying to pick a side.”

_Pick a side._ “Uh… s’pose so.”

Aziraphale looked miserably down at the table. “And she does love Arthur, of course, but—it’s different. He loves her like he loves all his subjects. Distantly. Not like Lancelot does.”

Behind the glasses, Crowley blinked hard. He was having difficulty telling whether they were still talking about Guinevere and Lancelot. It didn’t help that Aziraphale kept casually throwing around the L-word.

“And I think, maybe Arthur—” Aziraphale’s eyes flicked up to the ceiling, though Crowley doubted King Arthur was currently sitting on the roof, “—knows that, too. Understands that she…needs that. Maybe that’s why he doesn’t interfere.” He glanced up. “But his court would go mad if any of them found out. They’d be killed. It isn’t _done._ ”

“Yep,” said Crowley, whose understanding of the conversation was vacillating wildly between two options like an out-of-control metronome. What on Earth was happening? “I mean, nope. Not done.”

“So you see the problem,” said Aziraphale, with a sigh. “I’m afraid it’s too late to break them apart peacefully. They’re in it awfully deep.”

“They are?” Crowley’s heart was thumping out of control, and he couldn’t tell whether Aziraphale was doing this to him on purpose—If he was actually trying to communicate—

Aziraphale nodded and rested his head on both hands. “So either I put an end to it, and people get hurt, or I just...let it go on. Pretend it’s nothing.” He stared miserably down at the table. “I don’t know. What do we do about this, Crowley?”

Crowley’s throat was dry. He must have been reading too much into things, because there was no sensible reason for Aziraphale to ask what he thought he might be asking. “We?”

“I said ‘I,’” Aziraphale said. “What do you think I should I do?”

He had definitely said “we.” So did that mean that he was talking about…and that he also…?

Crowley swallowed. He could hide his own feelings well enough. Crush them into a little ball and stuff them down into the bottom of his ribcage, where at least nobody else would know they were there. He’d been doing it for centuries. But if Aziraphale’s feelings were also involved, that was going to be a whole lot more difficult. “What the heaven makes you think I’d know what to do?”

Aziraphale shook his head. “I don’t know. I don’t exactly have anyone else to ask.”

Crowley rubbed his face with both hands. “Do you want to…to ‘put an end to it,’ as you said?” That wasn’t going to be easy, but he could see the reasoning behind it. If that was what Aziraphale wanted…

“Of course I don’t _want_ that,” said Aziraphale quietly. “I’m asking if it’s the right thing to do. Angels aren’t really built for making tough choices.”

Crowley was the last person in the world anyone ought to be asking about this. Why was the angel putting it up to him, anyway?

He swallowed. There was one very simple reason Aziraphale might be offloading the decision onto him, and that was if he already knew Crowley would give him the answer he wanted to hear. He was putting the hard decision on Crowley so he wouldn’t have to feel responsible for the result. As an angel, of course he didn’t want to do the wrong thing. But that was Crowley’s whole job description.

“Well,” he said, trying to choose his words as carefully as Aziraphale had, “As you said, nobody’s getting hurt. Even, er, Arthur, if he already knows, like you say.”

Aziraphale nodded.

“And since Arthur’s been spreading peace through the land, it seems to me that, as an angel, you’d want his reign to go on as long as possible,” Crowley went on. The metaphor was breaking down. He wasn’t as good at this as Aziraphale was. “I mean, you’d want to, um, keep the peace. Keep everyone happy. Not get anyone killed. Right?”

“Right,” said Aziraphale, looking confused.

“So the way I see it, you have a moral imperative to keep their relationship hidden. Lancelot and Guinevere’s.” He was definitely off-track now. This was an answer to the question Aziraphale had asked, not the one he had meant. Or the one Crowley thought he might mean, anyway.

Aziraphale blinked. “You think, then, I ought to do nothing?”

“Yes,” said Crowley, hoping Aziraphale had understood that he was not only talking about Arthur’s court. “In fact, you have no other choice.”

The angel looked thoughtfully at the table for a moment. “I think you’re right,” he said quietly. “Thank you, Crowley.”

Crowley made a noise and recoiled from the thanks. He hadn’t done anything praiseworthy. He was just being selfish.

“Um…” Aziraphale fiddled with his hands. “Please don’t say anything about this. Not to anyone—Not even to me.”

Crowley understood. Acknowledging this thing out loud would only make it infinitely harder to ignore. “Right,” he said. “Not a word. Guinevere and Lancelot’s secret is safe with me.”

Aziraphale breathed a sigh of relief. “I—Thank you.”

“Stop bloody thanking me,” said Crowley, itching to leave and longing for more of Aziraphale’s company at the same time. He needed to go somewhere and spend about a week unpacking all this. He didn’t want the angel to leave. He was also definitely going to embarrass himself if he stayed here any longer.

“Thank you for understanding,” Aziraphale clarified. “And for talking with me about this.”

_What, exactly, did we just talk about?_ “Look, I jussst—” Crowley dragged one hand across his face. He was going to need a very stiff drink, or a very long nap, but most of all he needed to get out of this mess of a conversation. “I better get going,” he said, getting a bit unsteadily to his feet. “Been fun. Good chat. Best of luck with the court.”

He next met Aziraphale after Arthur’s kingdom had fallen apart. Apparently the queen was discovered with one of Arthur’s knights, and it was all downhill from there. In the back of his mind, Crowley couldn’t help but be nervous. Did it mean something that Guinevere and Lancelot had gone down in flames? Had Aziraphale changed his mind about exposing them, and what else might he have changed his mind about? Had Crowley already seen him for the last time?

They bumped into each other in the marketplace years later, and Crowley started, half afraid that Aziraphale might attack him or pretend he was a stranger. He wasn’t sure which would hurt more. But Aziraphale just gave a pleasantly surprised smile and greeted him normally. “You look a bit on edge,” he said. “Is everything all right?”

“Uh…” Crowley blinked. “It’s—This—You heard about that business in Arthur’s court a while ago?” Stupid question. Everyone had heard about it. And Aziraphale was part of the court.

Aziraphale’s eyes flickered down. He looked sad. “That dreadful misfortune? Yes. That…wasn’t my doing.”

That was something, then. “What happened?”

The angel thought for a moment, then shook his head. “I guess the truth finally came out.”

“Oh.” Crowley waited, heart pounding, for Aziraphale to say something else. Maybe he’d comment on how the truth always came out in the end, and it was foolish to think you could live a lie for any significant amount of time. And Crowley would have to agree, because as selfish as he was, he wouldn’t keep hanging around Aziraphale if the angel wanted him gone. And then that would be that.

What Aziraphale eventually did say was, “Well, I’ve got some errands to run. I’ll see you some other time, perhaps.” And then he was off in the crowd, and Crowley was standing there wondering what had just happened.


	3. 1601 A.D.

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Crowley and Aziraphale discuss theater and the human experience.

“S’you’re telling me,” said Crowley, the wine making his movements even wider and less controlled than usual, “the guy knew since act one he was s’pposed to kill Claudius? And he still dithered about it for four more acts?”

“Yes, that’s the whole point,” slurred Aziraphale, pouring himself another glass. “Revenge plot, with no actual sat…sastisfac…the end doesn’t feel good.”

“You’re damn right it didn’t,” said Crowley. “Whole cast dead onstage—”

“Except Horatio.”

“Most of the cast dead onstage, and then jus’…bloody Norwegian king shows up, takes over the place? Saved him a war, I guess.” He took another drink. “But that’s it!”

“That’s the whole point,” Aziraphale insisted. “Makes you think.”

Crowley made a noise. “Don’t like to think.”

“That much is clear.”

Crowley made a face at him, grabbed the wine bottle from the table, and poured the last few drops into his glass. “Glad I missed the first half. Waste of time.”

“S’not!”

“Mm-hm.”

“Why, Crowley.”

He looked up at Aziraphale’s pouting face. Of course he didn’t mean that. Any time with Aziraphale was worthwhile.

“‘S going to be a hit, though,” said Aziraphale, his expression turning smug. “Maybe his most popular ever. ‘Cause of you.”

Crowley groaned. “Wouldn’t’ve done it if I’d seen the whole thing. An’ Hamlet, whatsis deal? Can’t make up his mind.”

“That’s—”

“—The whole point, fine,” Crowley finished. “I mean Shakespeare, can’t make up his mind about who Hamlet’s supposed to be. Keeps changing, all the time, as a character. No…wazzat word…consistency.”

Aziraphale shot him a sullen look and drank more wine. “He’s _complex._ ”

“Pfah.”

“Humans are multifac…eteted creatures.” He hiccupped. “‘S’actually very meaningful, if you think about it.”

“Oh, you’ll find any way to justify Shakespeare,” said Crowley, waving a hand. “Everything he touches is gold.”

“He is a brilliant writer,” the angel insisted stubbornly. “Captures the human experience.”

“What do you know about the human experience?”

“What do _you?_ ”

Crowley couldn’t think of a reply, so he shot back a mocking sneer and refilled his wineglass from a bottle that was miraculously full again. “Bloody ‘human experience.’ Y’know, I think sometimes,” he said, and then stopped.

“Do you, now.” Aziraphale’s voice was dry, until he caught on to Crowley’s tone and expression. “Oh—About?”

Crowley didn’t answer immediately. It was a stupid thing to think about, much less spend hours thinking about, much less return to the idea time after time over a matter of centuries. He shouldn’t have said anything at all. But he was drunk, and it had slipped out, and now he would have to finish the thought or the stubborn angel was going to pull it out of him anyway. He swirled the wine in his glass, watching the liquid climb up the sides, cling to the edges, and ooze slowly back down. “If we were human,” he mumbled.

He wasn’t looking at Aziraphale, but he heard the angel draw a small breath. So he wasn’t the only one intruiged by the idea. To be human, to be able to choose—Choosing was the whole point, wasn’t it? Crowley would have chosen Aziraphale again and again if he could. And if he hadn’t completely misread things, and if Aziraphale should choose him _back_ …

They wouldn’t have to worry. They wouldn’t have to sweat whenever they shared drinks or a meal, or look over their shoulders during every conversation. They could risk more time together than once every few decades. They could be part of each others’ lives. They wouldn’t have to pretend there was nothing between them. Crowley could say the words that had been stuck in the back of his throat for millennia. He could tell the angel how much he meant to him. He could tell _everyone._

He swirled the wine again and watched it like it was the most fascinating thing in the universe. Sometimes, when he was feeling really low and had drunk a few bottles, he let himself indulge a particularly shameful fantasy. If they were both human, with no heaven and hell to control them, free to choose, they could…oh, Satan, they could get _married._ Get a little cottage out in the country. Aziraphale would be there every morning when Crowley woke up, and they could make each other breakfast—Crowley would grow his own tomatoes—and they’d spend the whole day together, Aziraphale reading and Crowley gardening, just the two of them and nothing to worry about in the world—

A ragged breath made him raise his eyes. Aziraphale was clutching his own glass with both hands, his head bowed over it as if in some drunken prayer. Feeling Crowley’s eyes on him, he glanced up. An effort at a smile flickered at his lips. “Do you…wish for that?”

It was a hard question to answer. If both of them were human, and had been born so, everything would be different. Aziraphale would never have given away the flaming sword. Crowley would never have started that conversation on top of the wall. Crowley would not be Crowley, and Aziraphale would not be Aziraphale. Crowley took a long sip of wine to delay the answer. “Sometimes,” he admitted. “Sometimes not.”

They might never even have met. They might have been born at the wrong times so their lives never overlapped. They might have lived halfway across the world from one another. And supposing that by some chance the timing had been right, and they had met and become as close as they were now, any number of things might still go wrong. Aziraphale might get tired of him. Crowley might accidentally fudge things up and drive him away. They might just…grow apart. That happened to humans quite often. It had never happened to him and Aziraphale, not in a way that lasted.

And even if things did work out, they would have less than one human lifetime together. A handful of decades. That was not nearly enough. At least, as celestial beings, they had time. So much that they could afford to waste it pretending they didn’t mean the world to each other. So much that they could go years between meetings, and still spend lifetimes in each others’ company.

“Oh.” Aziraphale’s voice trembled. So did the wine in his hands.

Crowley tried to swallow all the emotions in his throat. He gestured a hand at their surroundings, the book-filled flat, the wine bottle between them, the candle that had burned down to the nub and forgotten to stop burning. “Well, things would be different.”

Neither of them spoke for a while. Crowley drained the rest of his wine. Aziraphale just looked into his glass, trapped in the fingers of both his hands. He let out a ragged breath, and Crowley looked up, startled. The angel looked on the verge of tears.

“Sorry,” said Crowley, pulling a handkerchief from his pocket and handing it to Aziraphale like a white flag. “I’m sorry, I didn’t mean to—”

“Don’t be sorry.” Aziraphale took the handkerchief and dabbed at his eyes. He made another attempt at a smile. “It was…it was certainly a thought.”

He didn’t say what kind. Crowley wondered briefly what kind of adjective he might have used there. He ducked to hide his face for a moment, under the guise of adjusting his glasses.

“But only a thought,” said Aziraphale, as gently as he could.

“I know,” said Crowley. “Believe me, I know.”

They couldn’t choose. They weren’t humans. They were an angel and a demon who were supposed to be working against each other, not sharing a bottle of wine and pleasant conversation.

Aziraphale looked up from his glass. “Did you ever see _Romeo and Juliet?_ ”

Crowley stared at him in disbelief. Why the heaven would he bring up that blasted play? Now, of all times? “No,” he said, a little hurt in his voice. “I walked out in the first act.”

“Ah.” Aziraphale’s eyes fell. “I didn’t even make it through the prologue.”

Crowley slumped back on the couch and gave a dry laugh. “What a pair of idiots, right?” he said, not thinking about the characters in the play.

“Quite,” said Aziraphale. “Absolutely no self-control.”

Crowley shot him a confused look.

“Romeo and Juliet,” Aziraphale clarified.

“Oh, yeah. Them.”

“Took them less than a week after meeting to get themselves killed,” said Aziraphale.

“A _week?_ ”

He nodded. “A pair of idiots. Like you said.”

A week was nothing. The two of them had made it a thousand years. That made Crowley feel a little better. “How d’you know that, though? I thought you left during the prologue.”

“It was quite the success,” he said, sounding sorry for it. “People wouldn’t stop talking about it. I hear things.”

“Hm,” said Crowley sympathetically, wishing he’d done something about it. It would have been a fair trade, _Hamlet_ for _Romeo and Juliet._ He could at least get up and get a drink during Hamlet’s long-winded, indecisive soliloquies. Then he remembered he was supposed to have just traded _Hamlet_ for Edinburgh.

“Everyone enjoys a good love story, I guess,” Aziraphale sighed.

“ _Romeo and Juliet_ is not a good love story. They’re just idiots, and then they _die._ ” Crowley paused to finish off his wine. “Same with _Hamlet_.”

“Yes, yes, fine,” said Aziraphale impatiently. “We’ll see a comedy next, if it’ll make you stop grumbling.”

Shakespeare’s comedies were always better. The characters could make all sorts of terrible choices, and things still worked out okay in the end. “We’d better. Is a happy ending too much to ask for?”

Aziraphale blinked and gave a sad little smile, and Crowley swallowed. That wasn’t what he’d meant. They were talking about plays. Obviously the two of them weren’t going to get the standard happy ending. All he could do was hope for a happy middle, enjoy it while it lasted, and try not to think too much about the end.

“Well, I should be going, shouldn’t I?” he said, getting to his feet. “It’s getting late.”

Aziraphale looked for a moment like he wanted to say something, then nodded and cleared his throat. “Quiet right. Sober up before you go. Can’t have you…falling in the street, or somesuch.”

Crowley shut his eyes and forced the alcohol from his body. “Right. Well, thanks for Edinburgh, angel. See you around.”

“Of course,” said Aziraphale, and Crowley couldn’t be sure if he was addressing the first or second part of what he’d said. “Goodnight, my dear.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Crowley's really just out here writing a human AU isn't he


	4. 1783 A.D.

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> They have crepes.

The crepes were absolutely scrumptious. Aziraphale shut his eyes while he savored the first bite, so he could focus all his attention on the delicious flavors. It had been so long since he’d had a good crepe. Non-Parisians could never get the texture quite right.

He opened his eyes and found Crowley watching him, like he usually did whenever Aziraphale ate. The glasses didn’t do much to hide that fact. “Well?” he said wryly. “Worth nearly getting your head cut off over?”

“Undoubtedly,” said Aziraphale without hesitation. He couldn’t resist smirking a little at Crowley’s surprise.

“Well, maybe next time I’ll leave you to your fate,” said Crowley, annoyed. “Serve you right. Nearly getting killed over crepes—You are ridiculous, you know.”

“With that hair, you’re hardly one to talk about ridiculous,” said Aziraphale, gesturing at it with a fork.

Crowleys’ hand crept protectively to his head. “Well, look, they can’t all be winners. At least I have some variety. You haven’t changed yours in six thousand years.”

Aziraphale shrugged. “Why try to change perfection?”

Crowley let out a laugh at that. “You smug bastard.”

“I’m an angel,” Aziraphale said innocently, and punctuated the sentence by popping another forkful of crepes into his mouth and immediately forgetting the thread of the conversation. “These are simply marvelous,” he said, and looked over at the demon’s plate. “Crowley, you’ve hardly touched yours.”

Crowley looked down.. “Eh,” he shrugged. “Not really much of a food person.”

Aziraphale blinked, his eyebrows raising. “What?”

“Just doesn’t really do it for me,” said Crowley. “Why’re you looking at me like that?”

Aziraphale set down his fork furiously. “Crowley, this was supposed to be a thank you. You could have said something!” He threw up a hand and shook his head. “Why did you even come?”

Crowley folded his arms and gave him a sarcastic look. “Couldn’t tell you, angel.”

Aziraphale shot him a look, but couldn’t think of a reply.

“Look,” said Crowley, pointing at his crepe, “if I give you mine, will you give my hair a rest?”

“Oh, I don’t think I could promise that,” said Aziraphale, glancing up to the ridiculous thing on Crowley’s head.

“No extra crepes for you, then.” Crowley pulled the plate further to his side of the table.

Aziraphale peered across the table. On his recommendation, Crowley had ordered Chocolate and raspberry. Aziraphale would have gotten it himself, but he’d been to this creperie so many times that he thought he might try something different. That one was his favorite, though. “You aren’t really going to let a perfectly good crepe go to waste, are you?”

“Well, if it’s _good,_ then as a demon, I have no choice, do I?”

Aziraphale sighed, looking longingly at the crepe.

“Bloody hell—Fine.” Crowley pushed the plate towards him and held up both hands. “Just take the damn thing.”

“Oh! Thank you.” Aziraphale beamed and pulled the plate towards himself. “That’s very sweet.”

“It is _not_ ,” Crowley protested, turning red. “I’m a demon.”

Aziraphale raised one eyebrow. “I meant the crepe, my dear fellow.”

“Of course you did,” Crowley muttered, scowling and blushing at once. “Bastard.”


	5. 1862 A.D.

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> They have...an argument.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Remember that huge fight where they didn't talk to each other for eighty years afterwards? Want me to make it even worse???

When the knock came on the bookshop door, Aziraphale set down his book and massaged his forehead. “We are closed,” he called back, even though he knew he had flipped the sign. The shop hadn’t been open in two days, not since his last conversation with Crowley. Whoever was at the door knocked again, and he set down his book sharply and got to his feet to go to the door. “We really are closed,” he called, his voice rising. “You will have to come back later.”

The person knocked a third time, and Aziraphale wrenched open the door. “If you do not leave this instant—” He broke off. Crowley was standing there. Aziraphale swallowed. He didn’t particularly want to talk to Crowley right now. “You’ve never knocked on a door in your life.”

“Nope,” said Crowley. “Been practicing all day. How’s my technique?”

Aziraphale sighed. Leave it to Crowley to joke and pretend nothing had happened. He really was not in the mood for this. “What are you doing here?”

“Er…apologizing?” Crowley held up a small box. “Picked up some biscuits from that bakery you like. The big yellow awning one.”

After a moment’s thought, Aziraphale opened the door further. “Come inside.”

Crowley entered, followed Aziraphale into the back room, and set the box on the coffee table. He looked tense. Well, Aziraphale was tense as well. They hadn’t exactly parted on good terms. He sat down and looked at Crowley expectantly.

“I’m sorry,” The demon began. “I know it was a big favor.”

“Holy water, Crowley,” said Aziraphale. “You can’t—You can’t ask that of me, you understand?”

“I know,” said Crowley, holding up his hands. “And I won’t mention it again. You said no, and you were very clear. We can just forget it ever happened.”

“Forget?” How could Aziraphale forget about it, when he couldn’t shake the image of Crowley dissolving into nothing? When Crowley had given something new to be terrified of, on top of everything else? “I can’t just _forget,_ Crowley.”

“Okay.” Crowley swallowed slowly. “Don’t, then. But I swear I won’t ask again. Is that enough? What can I do?”

“I need your assurance that you’ll drop the idea,” said Aziraphale. “Don’t go looking for holy water. Promise me you won’t.”

Crowley looked away. He raised a hand and let it drop. “I…”

“Crowley,” Aziraphale pleaded.

He shook his head. “What do you want me to say? Everything could go wrong. If I end up in hell’s bad books, I’ve got to have _some_ way to protect myself.”

“Or to kill yourself,” said Aziraphale.

“I told you, that’s not what—”

“Anything could happen. Your hand could slip. Someone else could get hold of it and use it against you.” At some point he couldn’t remember, Aziraphale had gotten to his feet and started pacing. “You could—You could get it mixed up with your coffee, and—”

“I’m not an idiot,” said Crowley, getting to his feet as well. “And I didn’t come here to have this argument again.”

“Well, why did you come here?” Aziraphale whirled around to face him. “This is a pretty poor apology, I have to say. You’ve shown no real remorse, you haven’t changed your mind, you have no intention of dropping the matter—You’re not sorry at all, you just want me back on your side, and you think I’ll be won over by a few biscuits—”

“On my _side?_ ” Crowley repeated. “You’re not on my side. We were never on the same _side_ , you’ve made that abundantly clear. And I don’t see you tripping over yourself to apologize.”

Aziraphale gave a sharp laugh. “What would I have to apologize for?”

“ _Fraternizing?_ ”

He straightened his waistcoat and turned away, rolling his eyes. “You’re being childish, Crowley.”

“Is that all this is to you?” Crowley took a step towards him. “Fraternizing?”

Aziraphale gave him an exasperated look. Of course it wasn’t. They both knew that. But they had agreed never to acknowledge what it really was. “Yes,” he lied, “That’s all this is. That’s all it _can_ be.”

Crowley groaned in frustration. “It’s just so fucking cold, Aziraphale. You could have said anything else. Look, I can pretend I’m not in love with you—”

Aziraphale didn’t hear the rest of the sentence. There was a faint ringing in his ears. The room spun around him, and the next thing he knew he had sunk back into the couch, staring ahead with wide eyes.

“…Aziraphale?” Crowley was asking. “What’s wrong? What did I—” He broke off. His words caught up with him, and he froze.

Aziraphale’s throat was dry. He couldn’t look at Crowley. All at once it struck him how completely insane they had been to think everything would be fine if they just pretended. Of course it wouldn’t work. It was never going to work. As long as they were around each other, they risked slipping up and being discovered and killed.

“Sorry,” Crowley said holding up both hands. “Crossed a line. It won’t happen again, I swear.”

It would, though, if it had happened once. Time had not been kind to either of their hearts. This had only gotten more difficult to ignore, and would only keep doing so until one of their offices noticed and both of them were destroyed. They couldn’t keep risking it. “I…I think you should leave.” Aziraphale swallowed. “And I don’t think you should come back.”

He heard Crowley draw a sharp breath. “Can’t we talk about this?”

“No, we cannot _talk_ about this. I thought you understood that.”

“Aziraphale—”

He held up a hand. “Please. Just—go.”

Crowley stood there for a moment without saying anything. The only sound was the ticking of the clock. “Alright,” he said at last. “Well, I’ll just—Alright.”

His footsteps marked his passage to the door, and then the door opened and shut. Aziraphale’s hands were clamped so tightly on the edge of the couch cushions that his arms shook. It was for the best, for both of them. It was the only way to be safe. He had done the right thing.

So why did he feel like he’d just killed someone?

A sob clawed its way up his throat, and he pressed a hand to his mouth as tears spilled from his eyes. It was such a mistake, such a huge mistake, to spend so much time around Crowley. He should have known it would end like this. All the other possible endings were worse. God, he was so _stupid_ for not realizing it before. He could have saved himself from all this. Crowley, too.

But there was no point speculating. This was their reality. All he could do now was try his best to carry on without his dearest friend.


	6. 1941 A.D.

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Crowley retraces his steps to get some new decor for his apartment, and remembers a night of unexpected bombs and miraculously rescued books.

Crowley high-stepped his way through the rubble, hands in his pockets. The ground still hurt his feet, but it was at least bearable now. Maybe the roof had been keeping all the holiness in somehow. It also helped that this time, he had actually thought to wear thicker-soled shoes, and shoved a few extra layers of cardboard into the bottoms of them. Bit stupid of him to come back at all, really. He had finished his work here and seen Aziraphale safely to his bookshop a whole day ago. Plus, he was supposed to be spreading fear and panic through London, though he had decided the bombings were doing plenty of that for him.

Good, the eagle statue was still intact. He stepped over to it and stood there a moment, looking at it, rocking back and forth on his feet so the burn didn’t have enough time to settle in. Definitely stupid to want to keep it as a memento of that night, but he’d already done so many stupid things, so why stop now? Coming here in the first place was one of them, trying to keep Aziraphale safe after he’d made it plenty clear he wanted nothing to do with Crowley, standing with his ear pressed to the door and realizing the bombs were going to be about a minute too late if he didn’t do something quick, barging in to stall for time and realizing, oh, shit, consecrated ground—

He had no right to be there, rescuing Aziraphale just like old times, like nothing had ever happened, like Aziraphale would actually want him there. Aziraphale ought to have been angry. At first he had been.

_What are you doing here?_

_Stopping—you—from getting into trouble._

And he ought to have been furious when Crowley pulled his books from the rubble and once again tripped too close to the line they had drawn in the sand. They used to hover around that line and even come dangerously close to crossing it, but that was then. This was now. They weren’t friends, they weren’t even fraternizing. Aziraphale had made that very clear.

But instead of being angry, Aziraphale looked at him like he was the only thing in the world worth looking at, and Crowley didn’t know what to do. He never knew what to do. He heard himself offer Aziraphale a lift before he had thought it through, but then while he started to walk away, already regretting it, Aziraphale accepted.

Crowely tried to pick up the eagle statue, but found it much too heavy, so instead he miracled it into the trunk of his car and headed back the way he had come. He probably should have thought about that before he walked all the way over here. He could have saved himself the trouble of planning ahead with the shoes.

The drive home was quiet, with only the hum of the motor to listen to. It hadn’t been quiet at all when he drove Aziraphale home, between the wail of the air raid sirens and his own heartbeat pounding like a gong in his head and Aziraphale saying, _Thank you,_ and Crowley not knowing what to say. _It’s been a while. How, er, how have you been?_

_Been alright,_ Crowley lied. It had been a rotten eighty years. He’d spent most of it drunk or asleep, just to avoid it. Every so often he’d wake up having forgotten their fight, and things would be fine for a few minutes until he remembered that Aziraphale didn’t want to see him again.

He had seen him, once, by accident. They’d been walking down opposite sides of the street. Crowley noticed him first and tried to get someplace where he wouldn’t be visible, but he guessed his red hair and sunglasses and the whole way he carried himself were too distinctive to miss. Aziraphale looked at him and stopped, and Crowley froze, too, and for a second, they both just stood there and looked at each other. Then Aziraphale put his head down and kept walking.

Crowley tried not to think about that and asked, _What about you, how’ve you been?_

Aziraphale thought for a moment before saying, _Much the same as ever._

Crowley still didn’t know what he was supposed to draw from that. It sounded as if Aziraphale was doing just fine without him. Or, optimistically, it might mean that he still felt the same as he had before.

He reached his apartment, opened the trunk of the car, and looked at the big stone eagle wondering why he didn’t just send it straight to his apartment to begin with. He did that now, closed the trunk, and ambled inside muttering something about upper body strength.

When they had reached the bookshop, his car still dusty from the explosion, Crowley assumed that was going to be the end of it. _Well, there you are,_ he’d said as he pulled up to the curb. _Have a good night, try not to get yourself killed out there._ Except Aziraphale hadn’t left right away. He picked up the bag of books, looked at them for a moment, and then said, _Would you like to come inside for a drink?_

As always, Crowley didn’t know what to say. The last time they had talked, Aziraphale had explicitly told him not to come back. And, he hated to admit, he had a good reason. … _Do you think that would be a good idea?_

The angel’s face fell just a fraction. He didn’t answer the question, exactly, he just drew a small breath and said, _I would appreciate it if you did._ So Crowley had no choice but to put the car in park and follow him inside.

He’d thought maybe Aziraphale wanted to talk about something in particular, but it seemed he only wanted to talk, unless eighty years had been long enough for Crowley to forget how to read between the lines of what he said. It wasn’t the same as before, exactly, what with how thoughtfully quiet Aziraphale was, and Crowley scared out of his mind that he was about to be sent away again. But they were talking again.

_I don’t know about you,_ Aziraphale said after a few glasses, _but I found myself quite busy in…recent decades. They’ve got me hopping all about the country._

_Have they?_ Crowley was pretty sure that wasn’t true. Of course he had kept tabs on Aziraphale while they were apart. Someone had to keep him out of trouble, especially after he’d been struck by the ridiculous notion to become a spy. He should have known that he couldn’t stay out of sight forever.

_Yes, rather,_ said Aziraphale. _Terribly inconvenient. Um, I believe…That is, things were much easier when…_

_Aziraphale,_ Crowley interrupted, _what are you trying to say?_ If the angel was going to send him away again, he’d rather just be done with it.

Aziraphale raised his eyes to look at him. _I’ve really missed our arrangement, Crowley._

He didn’t have to say it like that. He’d been on the verge of a perfectly reasonable excuse about traveling and saving time. Instead he had said “missed,” like it meant something. Maybe this was his way of making amends for “fraternizing.” Crowley set down his wine glass before his hands started shaking and he spilled it on Aziraphale’s rug. _So’ve I._

Back in his flat, Crowely looked at the spot he’d chosen for the eagle. Right at the end of the hallway from the plant room to the study. Very visible. It wasn’t as if he had any visitors who might notice, and if he did, they would think it was just an eagle. Nothing out of the ordinary at all. Nothing to be embarrassed about.

Nobody else ever had to know. This was just for him.


	7. 1967 A.D.

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Crowley asks for some outside opinions on one of Aziraphale's riddles. They are no help at all.

Crowley stared down at the thermos in his hands. His ribcage felt like it was full of broken glass, too sharp to risk trying to piece it back together. He looked up, through the passenger-side window, and caught a glimpse of the back of Aziraphale’s head as he walked away. He half-expected the thermos to vanish after Aziraphale turned the corner, but it was still there, real and solid and heavy. Its contents sloshed around when he tilted it, and a shiver ran through him. He set it down on the passenger seat with both hands and belted it in.

Aziraphale loved him. There were only a handful of moments throughout history that he had been more certain than uncertain of that fact, and this one beat them all. The angel had always had him at a disadvantage, what with his ability to sense love even if it was unexpressed, but he’d just laid all his cards on the table. Well, that settled it. Aziraphale loved him.

But…

“I go too fast for him,” Crowley repeated. He stared blankly at the dashboard, both hands resting on the steering wheel. He and Aziraphale had had this understanding between them for too long for him to believe it was just about road safety. “Too fast for him,” Crowley said again. “What does that even mean?”

He puzzled over it nonstop for the next few months. “Too fast,” he said to himself as he flew down the highway at death-defying speeds. “Too fast?” he asked his plants as he spritzed them with water. “Too fast,” he accidentally muttered during one of Ligur’s presentations, and had to cover it with, “Uh, yeah, slow down, I don’t think Hastur caught that last part.”

Where was he meant to be going too fast, anyway? They hadn’t done anything more than talk. Yes, Crowley had slipped up and practically confessed out loud, but that was over a century ago. And he hadn’t been struck down by lightning yet, or turned into a pillar of salt, or swallowed up by the Earth, so he had to assume that the people who mattered either didn’t care or hadn’t noticed. And it was one time. Was that enough to qualify as a pattern of “too fast”?

“He’s the one who offered to buy me crepes in Paris,” he told a 50 pence coin as he glued it to the sidewalk. “And oysters in Rome.”

“He’s the one who invited me into his bookshop after that thing with the church,” he growled at the radio. Lou Reed sang back, _And I guess that I just don’t know, and I guess that I just don’t know,_ and both the song and Crowley’s car picked up speed like something big and heavy rolling down a hill.

“He’s the one who told me in the first place,” he said to a thoroughly confused barista as he waited for his coffee. “Well, not _told me,_ told me, but still. He started all this.”

“Most of it, anyway,” he admitted to a half-empty bottle of bourbon in his apartment. “I did sorta kick off our whole acquaintance with that ‘lead balloon’ comment. How was I supposed to know where it’d go?”

“And I did push him into the arrangement, just a little,” he told the pair of PVC gloves and large set of tongs in his shopping cart as he walked out of the hardware store without paying. “Just a little nudge.”

“And I guess I did keep on showing up unasked-for,” he told Mona Lisa version 0 as he took her off the wall and found a hollow behind the frame, housing a safe just the right size to hold a thermos. He hadn’t had a safe in his apartment before. He’d never had anything this much worth protecting. “And, y’know, accidentally broke the one ground rule he set from the beginning. On accident.”

“But how the heaven do I slow down now?” he asked his desk, one hand propping up his head and the other curled around another bottle, this one half-full of whiskey. “If it’s the whole feeling-sensing thing that’s offending him, I really can’t help it. Wha’m I supposed to do?”

“Look, jussst, what d’you want from me?” he said into the phone, thoroughly sloshed. “Why can’t you just say things like a normal person, ‘stead of making me guess? I mean, I know why, but…why?”

He woke up the next morning with vague memories of leaving Aziraphale an hour-long voicemail and panicked for a good thirty minutes before he remembered that Aziraphale’s phone did not have an answering machine.

“Shouldn’t have pushed him to the holy water thing,” he told his terrified plants. “Not that I knew he’d actually…I didn’t realize…”

“Should’ve just dropped it back in the nineteenth century, like he asked,” he told the sidewalk as he walked to the bar he liked near his apartment. He paused as a coin winked in the sunlight. “Oh, hey, fifty pence—Wait.”

“Should probably just apologize,” he told the bartender after his fourth shot of the hour. The bartender, who had no idea what he was talking about, nodded sagely, and was tipped generously for his trouble.

Crowley paused in the middle of the bakery, holding a box of fresh-baked scones and experiencing some serious déjà vu. “Or is that too much?” he asked the scones. “Too fast again? That’d be one fine apology, wouldn’t it?” He walked outside and handed the scones to the first person he passed. When the man gave him a questioning look, he replied, “Not even sure exactly what I’d be apologizing for.”

“Don’t know what I’m supposed to do differently,” he told Paul McCartney’s voice in his Bentley.

To his shock, Paul replied, _“You’re supposed to be securing souls for hell, Crowley. Your productivity has fallen dramatically this quarter.”_

“Uhh, right, yeah.” Crowley switched off the radio. “Thanks for the reminder, whoever that was.”

“I just…” he said to the eagle statue at the end of the hall, scorched from the bombings twenty-six years ago, still smelling a little of smoke even though that should have been impossible. “I just don’t want to lose him again.”

“Uh, hey,” he said to Aziraphale at last, standing in front of the doorway to the bookshop with his hands in his pockets. No scones. No biscuits. Nothing that might be too much. “Can I come in for a sec’?”

Aziraphale let him in with no questions asked other than, “Is something wrong, Crowley?”

“Nn, no, nothing wrong,” he said, trying to force himself to relax. “Got an assignment in Brighton. Wondered if you might have anything to trade for it. Just some pretty standard tempting, nothing too unsavory.”

“I’m sure I might have something,” said Aziraphale, his brow creasing in thought. “Why did you want to trade?”

Because there was a seafood place in Brighton that Aziraphale had called “delightful,” and brought up whenever it was relevant. “Had some stuff planned here, actually,” he said, waving a hand. “Concert tickets. Jimi Hendrix. He set a guitar on fire a few months ago.”

“Well, I’d hate for you to miss that,” said Aziraphale. “Certainly, I can take Brighton off your hands. We can just say you owe me one.”

“Oh—Sure,” said Crowley, relieved. At least the Arrangement was still on. “Thanks.”

“There’s no need for thanks. That’s the agreement.”

Crowley’s throat was dry. He couldn’t think of anything to say, and didn’t want to say anything without thinking in case he bungled things again. He’d gotten very good at that. He looked around the bookshop, hoping Aziraphale might say something else.

“Crowley?” the angel peered into his face. “Are you quite alright?”

“Hm? Yeah.”

“Was there anything else?”

He shook his head, wishing he was as good as Aziraphale at twisting words to mean something else. He wasn’t entirely sure why he had come. Part of him just wanted to reassure himself that the angel was still there, and Crowley hadn’t completely left him in the dust yet. That he hadn’t just thrown the thermos at Crowley and bolted for good. “Nope. Just gonna go now, I guess.” He started backing towards the door. “Got places to be. Very busy demon, me. Always racing around. ‘S what I do, right?”

“Oh.” Something passed over Aziraphale’s face.

Crowley reached the door and opened it. The bell jingled above his head. “See you, then, angel.”

“Crowley,” said Aziraphale, and Crowley stopped. “It’s been a while since we talked,” he said. “Maybe we can…catch up…one of these days.”

The words “catch up” stuck in Crowley’s brain like honey. “Right. Yeah.”

He turned it over in his head the entire way home. “Catch up,” he repeated over and over again. “Catch up, catch _up_ …” It was a coincidence, right? But, no, he had _paused._ He had definitely paused.

“Too fast,” he muttered, striding into his apartment and setting his sunglasses on the table. “Catch up…So I’ve just got to…” He stopped in the middle of his study. “…Wait…for him.”

Time. He needed more time. Crowley didn’t think he could slow down unless he disappeared from Aziraphale’s life entirely, and the angel had let him know in 1941 that he didn’t want that, either. Maybe it hadn’t been a request for Crowley to change something. He could catch up, one of these days. He just needed time.

He sat down and ran a hand through his hair. Aziraphale loved him. “Well, I waited this long,” he told the globe on his desk. He could wait as long as Aziraphale needed. And now, the waiting might not be hopeless.


	8. 2014 A.D.

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Co-parenting Warlock with Crowley is making it more difficult than ever for Aziraphale to keep his feelings in check. They have a celebration five years too early, and start a tradition.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The total chapter count keeps creeping up because I have no self-control but eleven is the final number! For real this time!

“Pssst, angel.”

Aziraphale started and shut his book. He’d been so absorbed in his reading that he hadn’t heard the door open. One hand moved to hide his face in panic—The large teeth he’d chosen for Brother Francis tended to get uncomfortable, and he’d taken to changing them back to normal at night—before he realized it was only Crowley. “You could have knocked."

Crowley _tsk_ ed, and somehow the curls she wore as Nanny Ashtoreth did not move at all when she shook her head. She stepped in and shut the door, holding something under one arm. “Jumpy.”

Well, of course Aziraphale was jumpy. He was masquerading as a human, working undercover with a demon, and trying to influence the Antichrist all at once. It was a lot to handle. “What is it?” he asked, setting his book aside. “Has something happened with Warlock?”

“Nah,” said the demon. “The little hellspawn’s fast asleep. Birthday party tired him out, and then I read him a lovely story about fire and blood.”

Aziraphale clucked his tongue in disapproval. “I will never understand why the Dowlings continue to employ you. What is it, then?”

“Thought we might celebrate.” Crowley shifted and pulled a bottle of champagne from under her arm, then held up two glasses clutched in the other hand. “Five years ‘till the end of the world.”

“That’s rather morbid, Crowley.”

“Nuh-uh, it’s not gonna happen,” Crowley insisted. “That’s what we’re celebrating.”

Aziraphale opened his mouth to say that it seemed presumptuous to celebrate this early, but it occurred to him that they might not have a chance to celebrate after. If they succeeded, things would have to go back to the way they had been before. The last few months he and Crowley had seen each other nearly every day. Parting ways after this was going to hurt. And if they failed, well.

“All right,” he said with a sigh. “I’m not one to turn down champagne.”

Crowley grinned, handed him a glass, and popped the cork off the bottle. “You know, for an angel, you can be _so_ easy to tempt.”

“Crowley!”

She snickered. “Just teasing.”

Aziraphale pretended to be offended, but let her fill his glass all the same. “Five years does seem rather premature, though,” he observed, watching the champagne bubble down. “Do you plan to do this every year until then?”

“Uh—Sure, I guess.” Crowley’s stutter revealed that she hadn’t thought that far ahead. “If you want.”

Aziraphale took a sip. A decade ago, the idea of seeing Crowely every year would have seemed fantastic. Being together every day as they were now would have terrified him. It still did, a little, but at least they had taken precautions. They were both in disguise, and even if their superiors did happen to recognize them, they could claim not to have recognized their enemy among the Dowling staff. Or, better, Aziraphale could claim he recognized Crowley, but that the demon thought he was just another human. That would impress even Gabriel.

“I don’t see the harm in making this an annual thing,” said Aziraphale. As nerve-wracking as it could be, he was enjoying this. He and Crowley had never spent this much time together in all their years of acquaintance. It was the little moments that made the difference, watching Crowley struggle to get little Warlock into his raincoat, or scrounging up some supper together in the kitchens, or just looking across the garden and seeing her on the other side. Sometimes, if he let himself forget, it was like their sides didn’t matter. Like they were just two people, living their lives side-by-side.

“Well?” Crowley raised her glass with a wry smile. “To Warlock, the Antichrist-not-to-be?”

Aziraphale echoed the toast and clinked his glass against Crowley’s. Before drinking, he hesitated and looked over at her, wishing she could sense what he could. He had tried so hard over the years to make his feelings understood, but he didn’t know how to tell if they were. He wished he could feel safe enough to tell Crowley how important she was to him. They were small enough words.

He shook himself and drank. It really was like falling, wasn’t it? He couldn’t go backwards, and couldn’t stop himself. All he could do was try to delay the inevitable. He had known it was inevitable since 1941, but the idea of what hell might do to Crowley if they knew still terrified him. But, again, he didn’t know how to make it stop. All he could do was try to keep Crowley safe for as long as possible, and hope she understood, and pray for just a little more time together.

Crowley lowered her glass and frowned at Aziraphale. “Something on your mind?”

His worry must have shown. He looked down into his glass, watching the pearl-strings of bubbles make their way to the surface and burst. Five years from now, the world would either be destroyed or it wouldn’t, and either way he and Crowley were going to see a lot less of each other. “I don’t want it to end,” he admitted.

“It won’t,” said Crowley. “Our plan will work.”

_I didn’t mean the world,_ Aziraphale didn’t say. He looked around helplessly, as if somewhere in the room he would find the right words to make himself clear and still maintain plausible deniability.

“Look, I promise you.” Crowley held up the champagne bottle. “We’re gonna keep doing this, alright? Once a year from now on. Every year ‘till Armageddon, and every year after.” She swallowed and added, “If…if you want.”

She sounded so frightened. “Once a year?” Aziraphale repeated.

“We don’t have to,” said Crowley hurriedly. “If it’s too much. You know what, nevermind.”

“Too much—Crowley, no.” Once a year was so little. It was nothing, compared to how often they saw each other now. Aziraphale knew he had caused Crowley pain over the years, and would probably never forgive himself for it, but had he really given her reason to fear his response to such a small proposition? “I think that sounds grand.”

“Oh,” said Crowley, visibly relieved. “Good. So, um…good.”

Aziraphale’s eyes fell to his glass. If he could just make Crowley understand why he had said those things, if he could just… just _tell_ her how much it had hurt him, too… “My dear,” he said before he could quite stop himself, “I’m so sorry if—”

“Don’t finish that sentence,” Crowley snapped. “Don’t ever apologize.”

Aziraphale blinked and swallowed the apology. Crowley was always far more generous with him than he deserved. “Thank you,” he said instead.

She made a face. “What for?”

For being so patient with him. For coming back, after Aziraphale had been so unforgivably cruel. For being there when Aziraphale needed her, and giving him space when he needed that, and crafting all these excuses for them to spend time together without having to acknowledge the real reason. For striking up a conversation six thousand years ago, and giving him the reassurance that he couldn’t find anywhere in all of heaven. For being Crowley.

“The champagne,” he said, raising the glass. “This was a lovely idea. To the world?”

Crowley considered the toast for a moment. “Yeah, I like that. To the world.”


	9. 2019 A.D.

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> They're on their own side now.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Not doing the bandstand scene because I literally cannot make it any worse. No thank you. Have a bus ride instead.

_We’re on our own side._

The words ricocheted around Aziraphale’s brain as he boarded the bus. His heart was beating very fast. They had been on opposite sides for so long, so very long. He had never let himself imagine for more than a minute or two what it might be like if that weren’t the case, and now suddenly the whole future was open to them, provided they managed to escape heaven and hell. And if they didn’t, well, they would only have a few hours together at most. Together. On their own side.

He sat down. Crowley stared out the window, fingers tapping absent-mindedly against his knee. It all hit Aziraphale like a train. His throat seized up as everything of the past two thousand years washed over him, and he was drowning in it—But he didn’t have to anymore, he could grab a bucket and bail himself out, he didn’t have to keep everything locked inside—Crowley’s hand was right there, inches away, inches that may as well have been miles for how impossible it had always been to cross them, but not anymore, _not anymore_ , and then Aziraphale’s hand was moving and it took everything he had not to shy away and keep pressing forward to cross those inches and then he was doing it. He was holding Crowley’s hand.

Next to him, Crowley started and looked down. He drew a small breath and turned his hand to fit more comfortably in Aziraphale’s. His thumb gently stroked the back of Aziraphale’s palm.

It was too much. His eyes filled with tears

Crowley looked at him in surprise and tried to drop his hand, but Aziraphale didn’t let go. He didn’t know what emotion the tears stemmed from, but they wouldn’t stop. His chest felt like it was about to crack. Noiseless sobs wracked his shoulders.

“Whoa, hey.” Crowley turned towards him and folded his arms around him, though it was a little difficult when Aziraphale was still holding one of his hands. “It’s alright, angel. Long day for all of us.”

 _Long two thousand years._ Aziraphale leaned into Crowley, burying his face in his shoulder, staining his jacket with tears. They’d never been this close before. He had wanted this for so long—They had both wanted it—But the words he needed to say were still stuck in his throat, trapped behind the wall of sobs that wouldn’t stop.

“We’ll find a way out of this,” Crowley assured him, rubbing one hand comfortingly up and down his back. “We’ve got Agnes’ prophecy. It’ll be okay.”

 _I love you,_ Aziraphale couldn’t say. Now that they could speak freely after so many centuries of dancing around it, he couldn’t. It wasn’t that he wasn’t ready. He’d made his choice. He just couldn’t get the words out.

“Shh, it’s okay.” Crowley was warm, and the love Aziraphale had sensed from him for millennia surrounded him like a blanket.

_Crowley, I love you._

His voice wouldn’t come.


	10. 2019 A.D.

The look on Aziraphale’s face was worth more than six thousand years of waiting. Crowley smiled back, his heart fuller than it had ever been before. “To the world,” he said, raising his glass as he had every year for the past five years.

“To the _world,_ ” Aziraphale repeated, but Crowley could have sworn he was saying something else, something he’d wanted to hear for millennia. God, he was so _good_ at that. He could say anything he wanted to say, without actually using the words. Crowley might be able to parse the meaning, but he could never figure out how to reply in the same way.

He sipped his champagne, and Aziraphale started talking about something else. Crowley listened without really listening, watching the way Aziraphale’s face lit up when he was excited, the shapes his hands made when they danced through the air, the warm smile in his eyes. What had Crowley ever done to deserve this in his life? What had he done to get this happy ending, against all odds?

His mind went off on a tangent about a cottage, and a vegetable garden, and waking up to this every morning…

He reeled the fantasy back in. He still didn’t know if Aziraphale would want that. For all Crowley knew, he was holding himself back for reasons that didn’t just have to do with their former employers. The previous night, he had taken Crowley’s hand and let himself be held, but he had been crying the whole time, and Crowley still didn’t understand why. He couldn’t mess this up. He would wait as long as it took.

But it had been so, so long.

“Crowley?” Aziraphale waved a hand in front of his face. “Are you in there?”

“Hm?” Crowley started a little. He hadn’t been paying attention at all. “Yeah. What’s up?”

“You looked a tad distracted. Penny for your thoughts?”

Crowley looked into his champagne like he might find the right answer somewhere in the bottom of the glass. He knew the rules. They didn’t talk about it. But if they were ever going to talk about it, this would be the time. He poked about for a moment for the right words to encode what he wanted to say, and then gave up. “Could I say it?” he asked. “Just this once?”

Aziraphale’s face melted into a smile. “Please.”

Crowley’s heart was definitely going to burst. He set down his glass and looked across the table at Aziraphale, and the angel was just so beautiful, his cheeks flushed and his eyes sparkling like the champagne. “I love you.”

Aziraphale’s smile was brighter than anything Crowley had ever seen. It made his heart stop. “My dear, dear Crowley.” Aziraphale took one of Crowley’s hands in both of his. “I love you, too.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> It only took them TWO THOUSAND YEARS.
> 
> This might be the sappiest thing I've ever written, and there's still an epilogue left. The sappiness might kill me.


	11. 2022 A.D.

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Local Husbands are Total Dorks

“Snacks,” Crowley announced, setting down a tray of bruschetta on the coffee table. “Fresh from the garden. Well, the tomatoes and the basil are. Obviously not the bread part.”

“Oh, marvelous.” Aziraphale picked one up and took a bite, holding his other hand below to catch crumbs. The tomatoes were perfectly ripe, the basil bright and crisp. He hummed in pleasure and swallowed. “Crowley, these tomatoes—I certainly don’t agree with your methods, but I suppose I can’t argue with the results.”

“See? Told you. They need discipline.” Crowley surveyed the table. “Okay, we got food, blankets, pillows, and lots of demonically torrented films. Missing anything?”

“Ah!” Aziraphale jumped up from the couch and hurried into the kitchen. He returned a moment later with a bottle and corkscrew in one hand and two glasses in the other. “How could we forget wine?”

Crowley grinned. “ _Now_ it’s perfect.” While Aziraphale was in the kitchen, the demon had wrapped himself in so many blankets that it took him a few seconds to wriggle one arm out and reach for a glass.

Aziraphale looked at him for a second. “Crowley.”

“Yes, angel?”

“Have you wrapped yourself in _all_ the blankets?”

Crowley’s grin widened. “Is this all of them, really? We don’t have more?”

“You cannot possibly have need of that many blankets.”

“I get cold,” said Crowley. “Seriously, if I missed one, just point me to it.”

With a long-suffering sigh, Aziraphale sat down beside him and began to open the wine. “I cannot _believe_ I married you.”

Even after two years, he still couldn’t sometimes. For instance, when Crowley’s gardening sessions got loud enough to disturb the neighbors, and Aziraphale had to assure them all that his husband was perfectly fine, he’s only addressing the plants, so sorry about the disturbance, have a lovely day. Or when the gossipy woman across the street made one comment too many about Aziraphale’s fashion choices, and a few days later complained about a burst pipe in the closet that had ruined most of her clothes, and Crowley insisted, in a tone that suggested the opposite, that he had no idea what might have caused that. Or on days like today, when rain pounded against the roof and the plants outside tapped on the windows, and the two of them could curl up on the couch to read or watch whatever film or television show Crowley picked out and just enjoy being together.

“Me either,” said Crowley, still grinning. “You’ve got no one to blame but yourself.”

“I suppose so.” Aziraphale had been the one to ask, if it could even be called that. He had been reorganizing some of the bookshop a few months after the failed Armageddon, looked down to find himself holding a copy of _Pride and Prejudice,_ and then peeked around the edge of the bookshelf to ask, _Crowley, do you want to get married?_

_I mean, yeah,_ Crowley said, without even looking up from whatever game he was playing on his phone.

_Oh, splendid,_ said Aziraphale, and went back to his work.

It was a few minutes before Crowley appeared at the end of the shelf, sputtering, _Wait, were you asking—to you?_

Aziraphale filled Crowley’s glass, then his own, and settled back against the couch and eyed the mountain of blankets Crowley had buried himself under. “Were you planning to share?”

“Oh, fine.” Crowley wriggled free of some of the blankets and held out one end to Aziraphale. “Only ‘cause I love you.”

“That’s very generous of you.” Aziraphale shifted under the blanket and leaned against Crowley, who moved closer and wrapped an arm around his shoulders. “What’s on the agenda this time?”

Crowley turned on the TV and reached for his tablet on the coffee table. “It’s a, er, comedy,” he said, trying to find whatever he had pirated for them to watch (which was completely unnecessary, Aziraphale often pointed out to him, to which Crowley usually replied that it was more interesting this way, and then Aziraphale would remind him how many viruses his electronics had caught because he refused to pay for a streaming service). “Sort of a dark comedy. Two melodramatic idiots who can’t keep it together.”

_Romeo and Juliet_ popped up on the screen.

“Now, hear me out,” said Crowley, before Aziraphale could protest. “They’ve modernized the setting of this one, but they kept all the dialogue, so it’s completely bloody ridiculous. I’ve seen pieces. ‘Course, we don’t have to,” he added. “I’ve also got a version of _Emma_ set in a 90s high school, if you’d rather do that.”

Aziraphale had to laugh. Only Crowley would come up with the idea of watching _Romeo and Juliet_ as a comedy. It felt like a victory lap, an assertion of their own triumph in a similarly difficult situation. It was brilliant. “I love you, dearest,” he said, leaning his head against Crowley’s shoulder.

“Yeah, I know. Love you too.” Crowley pressed a kiss to the top of his head. “So is that a yes to anachronistic Shakespeare?”

“Most of his plays contained anachronisms,” Aziraphale pointed out. “One might even say it’s in the spirit of Shakespeare to—”

“Sure,” Crowley interrupted, pressing play. “See if you still think that after they start calling guns ‘swords.’”

“What—They couldn’t even change that one word? Really?”

“Told you,” said Crowley, “It’s ridiculous.”

“Why, though?”

“Who cares? Shh, it’s starting.”

“But—”

“It’s _starting._ Do you want to keep asking me about it, or actually watch the bloody thing?”

Aziraphale relented, and soon the most absurd, over-the-top rendition of Shakespeare that he had ever seen unfolded on the screen in front of him. He and Crowley were soon shaking with laughter enough to spill their wine. Crowley, despite how he had chided Aziraphale for talking at the beginning of the movie, had a habit of shouting things at the characters as if they would hear him and rethink their decisions. “You don’t love each other, you just met,” he yelled at one point, or, “It’s morning, get out of her bedroom, you idiot,” or, “Are you serious, turn _around_ —Bloody—Say something, Juliet!”

“You are aware,” Aziraphale pointed out, because Crowley had gotten himself quite worked up by this point, “that they cannot hear you?”

Crowley waved furiously at the screen. “Look at this, angel. Now he’s killed himself, and she wasn’t even dead. Amateurs.”

Aziraphale snorted. “Would that make us professionals, dear?”

“Professional star-crossed lovers?” Crowley looked up with an amused grin. At some point during the film, he had moved from leaning against Aziraphale to lying with his head in his lap. “Well, nobody ever paid us for it, but we’re definitely the best. I doubt there’s anyone with more experience.”

“Very true,” Aziraphale admitted. “It was quite a long time.” In all those years, he’d never imagined it could end like this, sitting on the couch with his fingers carding through Crowley’s hair and nothing, not heaven or hell or anything on Earth, threatening to separate them.

“Mm,” said Crowley. “Worth it, though.”

Aziraphale smiled down at him, his heart overflowing with love. “Undoubtedly.”

The rain had let up, but they had already planned to spend the rest of the day like this, and neither of them were inclined to get up from the couch anytime soon. Crowley put on another film, but Aziraphale found that it hardly mattered what they were watching, as long as they got to be like this. An angel and a demon, on their own side, together.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> If you thought I was gonna let this end without roasting Romeo and Juliet one last time, you were sorely mistaken. Also, letting them get married, but mostly I wanted to make fun of Romeo and Juliet. The 1996 movie is really something.
> 
> Thank you so much for reading, and an extra thank to everyone who left kudos and comments!


End file.
